(7-25) Carthage UA/UNW Reworks

[pineappledan]

Counterproposal to this:

[Complex] - (7-NS) Polynesia UA and Carthage UA+UB rework

Problems: 1) Both Civs underperform in AI tests. (Especially Polynesia, but Carthage too dependent on map) 2) Carthage and Polynesia are different but have one thing in common – they have ability to use water tiles earlier than ordinary Civs. While it could be justified for Polynesia, it’s...

forums.civfanatics.com

Spoiler Carthage UA Proposal :

Current Carthage UA

• 125 Gold when settling cities, scaling with Era.
• Owned Coastal cities receive a free Lighthouse
• Double Resource Diversity modifier

Proposed Carthage UA

• 100 Gold and 25 When your ownership of a Luxury Resource increases, scaling with Era.
• Double Resource Diversity modifier
• +5 XP to all Military Units purchased with Gold, scaling with Era.

Spoiler Carthage UNW proposal :

Current Carthage Great Cothon:
Unlocks at Currency (2 techs early)
Requires Market (instead of customs house)
+2 Trade Route Slots
-1 poverty
+2 to lighthouses and +3 to Harbors on Empire
All standard East India Company bonuses
Trade Route target and recipient bonus is 1 higher

Harbor bonuses:
+1
+150 HP
+2 War Supply
+15% when building naval units
+50% sea trade route length and +2
When a Sea Trade Route originating here and targeting another Civ is completed, receive a Tourism boost with the Civ based on your culture output
+1 to coast and ocean tiles
+1 to sea resources
Can buy Cargo ships with

Proposal:
Remove the Market requirement from Cothon
Add Coastal Only.
Cothon gives a free Harbor in all coastal cities.

Rationale:

• Carthage has been doing poorly in test games, and are appear to be in need of some buffs. I diagnose the problem as being that they have basically nothing except 2 more, slightly better trade routes after ancient era.
• The casting of Carthage as an ancient civ with early bonuses that just coasts is bad history. They are Carthage, not Phoenicia, the specific incarnation that is strictly bounded by existing between 900BC and 250BC, firmly classical era. Yet they are defined by what the Phoenicians did by colonizing the Mediterranean, and not other aspects of their culture.

Carthage UA

• Carthage's gold on settle overlaps with Spain, who also gets turn 1 gold from settling, and scales horribly. It's a complete non-entity after classical.
• I propose that the trigger for Carthage's instant gold be moved to connecting new resources to their trade network.
  • This is more unique, but still thematic to how the Phoenicians and later Carthaginians introduced and controlled the trades of lumber, glass, wine, and dye in the Mediterranean
  • The gold would trigger when the total number of any resource you have ever owned increases by 1. This is to prevent the bonus from triggering if you lose/regain the same city with the same resources.
  • Basing the trigger off total ownership means the game only needs to store the max amount of any resource Carthage has owned at one time, and not have to track all resource tiles on the map for Carthaginian ownership. This is more technically feasible and easier on memory, but does mean that if you lose 1 resource tile via conquest or tile stealing and then improve a different resource tile of the same type the instant yields won't go off
  • This ability ties into Great Admirals' Voyage of Discovery action in a way that is very thematic for Carthage. Hanno the Navigator unlocked.
  • The addition of to Carthage's kit ties into their technological edge over other Mediterranean powers during its heyday, Phoenicians' creation of seamanship and shipbuilding, and the alphabet.
• The new XP bonus on unit purchases is a reference to Carthage's heavy reliance on mercenaries and allies for their military strength.
  • This ability can be used as an offset to the XP penalty levied against purchased units
  • Alternatively, it gives a good synergy with the Authority Finisher and with Freedom's Draft Registration abilities, converting it into bonus XP.

Carthage UNW

• The Cothon was a harbor, so free harbours are very thematic. This also recalls the original vanilla bonus.
• The Harbor gives a lot of very useful and thematic bonuses that help Carthage's overall strategy. Having access to them early would be a both a flavor and power boost
• Being able to buy Cargo ships early and having access to the naval production modifier in time for Carthage's UU would be very useful.
• The Cothon gives +3 to harbours, but in the current kit you have to wait a full era for that bonus to come online. With the free building moved from lighthouse to harbours, all Cothon building boosts would be accessible when the UNW is unlocked.
• The market prerequisite is pretty pointless. It's a very early and very cheap building; I don't know why the Cothon needs any prerequisites at all.

MAGI: Complex proposal, DLL and database changes, database changes sponsored by pineappledan

 

[rkkn]

do imports count for these luxury instant yields?

 

[pineappledan]

do imports count for these luxury instant yields?

No, they have to be owned resources. ie they need to be resources that are available for you to export.

 

[Stalker0]

The idea is interesting and cool but unless those trade route bonuses are out of this world this looks like a solid nerf to me for Carthage. Yes, carthage will get some more science, but her secret sauce right now is that I can expand like crazy, every city gets a free lighthouse (which is actually amazing for early coastal cities), and then I have tons of gold to get all of my infrastucture up and running.

This version comes online later, and scales weaker in my opinion. I would up the gold amount a bit more, I think the science is fine but if the goal is to buff the civ we need to keep that infrastucture power alive.

 

[rkkn]

yeah it's deffo weaker. the yields per trigger are comparable, and you can get 2 or 3 triggers per city instead of just 1, but it comes out a lot slower. the initial one is like 30+ turns later, which makes it a lot worse. The yields for later cities aren't delayed by as much, but overall I'd say it's a wash at best. But that's only comparing the yields. The lighthouse is also getting deleted, and the replacement trade route thing looks like it'll do nothing on higher difficulties (in human vs AI). So UA got cut in half.

 

[pineappledan]

yeah it looks a little low to me too. Increased to 100 and 25 per lux.

Most starts have 3 luxuries in working distance, so that should be 300 75 for your starting position once you set up, but that's delayed significantly off the start when compared to now.

At 100 per lux connected, that almost pays for a new worker every time you improve a new one. Should get the motor running

 

[pineappledan]

The lighthouse is also getting deleted, and the replacement trade route thing looks like it'll do nothing on higher difficulties. So UA got cut in half.

The TR bonus should still be useful as long as you aren't bottom of the pack and are willing to trade with people who aren't the tech leaders. It could be a pretty decent yield source if you are keeping a weakened vassal around.

Perhaps I should consolidate these two proposals after all, because without the buff to the Cothon in this proposal it looks like some deep cuts.

(7-48) Carthaginian Great Cothon buff

Current Carthage Great Cothon: Unlocks at Currency (2 techs early) Requires Market (instead of customs house) +2 Trade Route Slots -1 :c5unhappy: poverty +2:c5culture: to lighthouses and +3:c5production: to Harbours on Empire All standard East India Company bonuses Trade Route target and...

forums.civfanatics.com

 

[Tekamthi]

is it not also somewhat of a nerf to polynesia? +2 food from fishing boats from UA stacks with lighthouse, doesnt it? in proposal there will be only lighthouse bonus

I'd prefer to see carthage & polynesia as separate proposals, its somewhat a barrier to entry for counterproposer that they'd have to come up with a good idea for BOTH

 

[azum4roll]

Trade Routes generate Science ( Culture) for each Technology (Policy) you have that the target civ does not.

The wording makes it sound like you'll get a ton of Culture off trade partners with different policy trees.

 

[pineappledan]

I'd prefer to see carthage & polynesia as separate proposals, its somewhat a barrier to entry for counterproposer that they'd have to come up with a good idea for BOTH

Not possible if they are using the same bonus (lighthouse)

is it not also somewhat of a nerf to polynesia? +2 food from fishing boats from UA stacks with lighthouse, doesnt it? in proposal there will be only lighthouse bonus

It does currently stack. On balance it is a large buff. Keeping both would be off the table, as far as I am concerned, and the +2 to fish always struck me as overkill. Are you struggling to grow fast enough on coastal cities with fish? I think no.

 

[rkkn]

is it not also somewhat of a nerf to polynesia? +2 food from fishing boats from UA stacks with lighthouse, doesnt it? in proposal there will be only lighthouse bonus

I'd say it's a buff. You get less food, more production, more gold, more vision. The food malus is larger in magnitude than the production and gold bonuses, but it looks like a winning trade overall as the vision has good value imo. It's arguable though.

 

[pineappledan]

Updated OP.
Added cothon UNW change: gives a free harbor to all coastal cities when built.
Restore a bit of the vanilla kit. Keeps the free building bonus but with a building that is thematic to Carthage.
The free building to all cities on wonder code is currently sitting unused, since we changed CN tower’s free broadcast tower.

 

[Tekamthi]

Not possible if they are using the same bonus (lighthouse)

But they don't? Polynesia has no lighthouse bonus, speculative future states notwithstanding. both can list whichever bonus as independent proposals -- if two civ's end up with overlapping UA features, this is not actually a conflict, just subjectively undesirable -- Aztec and Iroquois already have essentially the same UA kit, it's no biggie, certainly not a reason for these omnibus proposals

 

[pineappledan]

If you list them as separate proposals you leave open the possibility that one change will be approved and one will be rejected.

Aztec and Iroquois already have essentially the same UA kit

You mean iroquois and Songhai? Aztec and iroquois are very different.

 

[Tekamthi]

Aztec and iroquois are very different

You're right, I over stated the example. But the forest/jungle movement bonuses, perhaps their most visible ua features, these are very samey feeling.

My point is if Carthage and Polynesia end up with the same lighthouse bonus as singular components of their broader kit, it's not the end of the world. We just change it next congress if it matters.

I don't have a good sense of how Carthage plays right now, it's been over a year since I last played with them in a full game... I would just be guessing to make a proposal. But I do know a little about Polynesia, and could put something interesting forward as counter if they were separate. I imagine we'd get more counters to both if they were separate

 

[pineappledan]

This makes me think you haven’t played an Aztec game past turn 100. The woodsman promo is tied to Aztec’s UU, but Iroquois gives woodsman to all land units.

 

[Tekamthi]

I suppose I was confusing the UA and UU stuff in the conversation thus far, but the uu's of those two nonetheless have exact same 33% bonus applied, dont they? and the presence of this one same aspect amongst a broader set of different features is not a game breaker.

Polynesia and Carthage ending up with same bonus in this narrow sense, though I agree it's undesirable, is not a conflict that requires bundling of the proposals. If it's undesirable enough, people will align their votes accordingly.

It is open for anyone to propose a polynesia- or carthage-only change as standalone -- such wouldn't be breaking any congress rule... And then how would we handle the vote for these bundled versions alongside?

 

[Stalker0]

MAGI: We do need this proposal to specify how much science and culture is generated by the trade route value to finalize this proposal.

 

[pineappledan]

OP updated.
Removed "Trade Routes generate Science ( Culture) for each Technology (Policy) you have that the target civ does not."
Added "+5 XP to all Military Units purchased with Gold, scaling with Era."

The additional trade bonus is finicky. As pointed out by other users, it could be highly variable in usefulness based on difficulty and the strength of opponents, which makes it feel too far outside of a player's control. It's also very wordy for a bonus that probably won't be too strong. It doesn't justify the space needed to describe it in the UA text.

Replaced with a bonus for purchasing military units. This is a reference to Carthage's heavy reliance on mercenaries (and all the trouble that caused them) to fight their wars. This opens up a big synergy with the mercenary units from Authority, and with Freedom's Draft Registration.

 

[Tekamthi]

• +1 Sight when Embarked. Units can Embark and enter Deep Ocean immediately.
• +2 Food from Fishing boats and atolls.
• Melee and Gunpowder Units can construct fishing Boats.
• No unhappiness from isolation.

...carrying on discussion from the other thread, as its slightly more relevant here. This UA is specifically designed to make the slightly-inland cities more viable, and slightly inland island cities are more defensible than coastal, generally speaking

Owned Coastal cities receive a free Lighthouse

while reproducing certain similar things, the loss of the slightly-inland advantages may render polynesia more vulnerable than they already are. Consider giving free lighthouse to ALL cities, or all cities with >x water tiles in radius, etc.